


So Mean and Low

by orphan_account



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Adult in a Position of Power, Golden Age (Comics), M/M, Masochism, Mild S&M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-07
Updated: 2013-01-07
Packaged: 2017-11-24 01:01:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/628508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sudden rush of years-old mortification makes him flinch, one elbow digging into the bandages trailing nearly the entire length of his left side.  The bruising is tender: a sickly, disgusting yellow underneath the layers of soft cotton and ointment, and the sharp bit of contact makes Dick want to yowl, want to drive the head of his equally tender erection off onto the pale sheets, onto Bruce’s <i>stomach</i>, hard and lean and coarse with the dark trail of hair starting at his naval and thickening as it continues downward.</p>
            </blockquote>





	So Mean and Low

Eight thirty in the morning. One hour until breakfast. Forty-five minutes until Bruce inhales, like clockwork, rolls fluidly onto his side and cajoles Dick into reluctant wakefulness.

Ordinarily.

Winter is kind to the two of them; the sun doesn’t threaten to leak around the edges of the master bedroom’s thick maroon curtains until much closer to noon, and when it does it’s a weak, gentle light, enough to see by but not to disturb.

Bruce is—closer, Dick realizes, than he normally is. Though perhaps—

-perhaps realizes isn’t the right word, for something he’s been acutely aware of since he blinked wearily into consciousness an hour ago to the feeling of Bruce’s breath disturbing his hair, that huge, admirable body curled warmly around him; not quite touching, but it was a near thing.

Dick used to love to watch Bruce when he went to work with the barbells. ‘A healthy body contributes to a healthy mind,’ he’d told Dick, another one of the silly, oversimplified kid-things that made him feel ‘in the loop’ back when he wasn’t big enough to take on patrol yet, and Dick remembers telling him that he must have the best mind of all.

It’s an embarrassing thing to ruminate on. Dick doesn’t watch Bruce anymore, with the barbells or on the pommel horse or anywhere else, though not for lack of wanting to.

The sudden rush of years-old mortification makes him flinch, one elbow digging into the bandages trailing nearly the entire length of his left side. The bruising is tender: a sickly, disgusting yellow underneath the layers of soft cotton and ointment, and the sharp bit of contact makes Dick want to yowl, want to drive the head of his equally tender erection off onto the pale sheets, onto Bruce’s stomach, hard and lean and coarse with the dark trail of hair starting at his naval and thickening as it continues downward. 

It’s a body Dick both admires and covets—he’s no nancy himself, with a strong chin and wide shoulders, getting ‘more strapping by the day,’ as Alfred says, but he entirely lacks the incredible girth Bruce seems to possess. Dick breathes deeply through his nose. Tries to get his bearings again, because this is. 

Is shameful. Depraved. He looks down, to where their legs are almost intertwined, and even through their loose night pants, he can see how thick Bruce’s thigh is, muscle-bound and effective, next to his own chicken legs and narrow waist.

It’s embarrassing. So embarrassing, it seems, that his cock leaks for it. Dick wants to cry, wants to fall asleep, wants everything to go away. 

This was all Scarface’s fault, him and his hired help: Dick could control his urges so much better than this when he wasn’t hurt, hurt and _randy_ for it, when he didn’t have to sit through half an hour of admonishments and gentle apologies as Bruce tugged four neat stiches through his skin, rubbed salve into painful, purpling skin, murmuring so sweetly while Dick whimpered (though if the man truly knew at _what_ Dick thinks he’d die on the spot—)

 

“Dick?” Bruce’s eyes are on him when he looks up, the drag of his face against the pillow leaving a wet trail behind it, and-

“G-god damn i—“

“ _Dick!_ ” 

His next little sob turns into a mortified hiccup; he hadn’t, hadn’t meant to, he’d just been so startled, so _frustrated_. 

The way his voice cracks is less than ideal, but so much better than carrying on with an urchin’s language. “Bruce, I-“

There’s a hand at the side of his head, combing gently through the tangled hair there, and Dick leans into it. “I know, Dick. It’s alright. Just… be mindful.” He continues before Dick can even begin to nod vigorously, eyeing the tears still wet on Dick’s cheeks with obvious discomfort and a clumsy, uncommon tenderness.

“Have you been up the whole night?” Bruce looks discomfited at that, as though it were somehow a fault of his own, not noticing Dick’s distress, perhaps not tending to him well enough before bed.

It wasn’t though, and Dick never wants Bruce to think that of himself, not when the source of his discomfort is nothing but Dick’s own shortcomings and distasteful unconventionality. “No! I only woke about an hour ago, because…”

Because his hips had been pushing softly but insistently at the bedding, penis jumping every time one of those movements created pressure on the little row of stitches just above his hip bone, and he’d been panting so enthusiastically into the pillow beneath his head that he’d woken from a distinctly stressful lack of air.

“Because your side hurt?”

He nods emphatically. He hates lying to Bruce, more than anything, but in this rare instance it’s infinitely preferable to telling the truth.

Bruce sits up, nudges at his good arm to indicate he should do the same. Blessedly, the blankets pool and bunch across his pelvis with the motion, obscuring the source of his shame. From the bedside table, Bruce grabs a small pot something sickly sweet smelling and opaque, dipping his fingers into it.

“You should’ve woken me, Dick; what kind of a chum would I be if I were irked by your malaise?”

Dick’s hands fist the fabric at his sides, excitement mixing with dread low in his stomach as Bruce reaches for his injured side. “I didn’t think you’d be upset! I just… wanted to be a man about it. Like…”

Bruce catches the unspoken hint more clearly than Dick would’ve liked. “Like me? Dick,” And there’s that fond little voice again, the one that had gone from registering as kind to condescending to mind-numbingly arousing all in the space of one perplexing year, “nothing could make me happier than you aspiring to be as little like me as possible. You-“ A kiss at his temple, as Bruce works some of the oily substance with infinite mindfulness into his skin, and Dick is lost, stomach tight with butterflies, “are _far_ too decent a man for that.”

Dick doesn’t get it, not at all (who wouldn’t want to turn into someone like Bruce,) but he nods, putting his head down and shutting his eyes tight and pretending every little noise he’s not strong or reserved enough to restrain is agony.

One minute and fourteen seconds later, Bruce is done. 

“There.” It’s punctuated by an affectionate swipe against Dick’s unharmed torso, tickling low on his belly, and Bruce smiles for the way it makes his ward snort in unexpected mirth. “Alfred will be up soon to roust us for breakfast; can you get changed by yourself?”

“ _Yes._ ” It’s an enthusiastic response. Bruce probably thinks he’s offended the boy with the implication of lameness, and makes an appropriately contrite face, which is just as well, considering; Dick glances pointedly towards the bathroom, and Bruce gracefully slides out of bed, nodding at him. “I’ll shower in the spare bath this morning.”

Dick nods again, silent for the unexpected thickness of his throat and sudden difficulty swallowing. When Bruce has closed the door behind himself, Dick steps gingerly out of bed, and limps, careful not to interact in any way with his swollen penis, towards the master bathroom.

\---

The cover story is that he fell off a horse, which is—

—okay, it’s a little bit embarrassing, but it does a better job explaining the scope and pattern of his injuries than most of their thin façades do, and that’s something to be happy about.

The pain is still a problem, in that deeply uncomfortable and equally unusual way that it had been ever since Bruce had started minding him more tenderly for it. Dick feels the need to explain himself to someone, despite the care he’s taken so that nobody knows— he didn’t feel like this at the time of infliction: when catching Rhino’s massive, meaty fist in the side of his ribcage, it had felt every bit as awful as he remembered pain being, every bit as awful as it should have felt. 

It was just. Bruce. When he’d run, frantic, over to check on him, fingers skating too fast, too hard over traumatized skin, not knowing where the damage was, that this had started. Nearly concussed, Dick had flashbacks to the exceptionally few vice missions Bruce had allowed him to come along on: smoky rooms, and things he shouldn’t have enjoyed watching, hearing from a room away. 

His ban on strenuous activity is an obvious precaution, for the first five or so days. Understandable, the three past that. By the second week, though, Dick is stir crazy. It’s not just the lack of continuous motion he’s so terribly fond of, or the bordering on condescending pity of his classmates. It’s…

…Bruce, treating him like a paramour.

Well, not exactly like a paramour, but it’s… close enough for consideration. He’s avoided galas and cotillions, staying home to tend to Dick’s wants and whims, leaving only to manage Wayne Enterprises and scour the city for wrongdoers. Every invitation to dinner is dismissed, every news opportunity passed up; if Bruce weren’t being so gosh-darn careful, like his kid gloves were glued on, Dick would say things were perfect.

Exhibit A on why he needs to get out. It isn’t acceptable, to want a man (‘To want your _father_.’ a solicitous voice in his head whispers, and it’s not with anything resembling distaste for the implications) to hold your hand as you get out of cars and kiss you at night. They slept in the same bed because Dick was loathe to be alone, even after all these years, and to pervert that gracious concession of Bruce’s into something unduly, unhealthily _sexual_ was completely inexcusable.

He doesn’t hear the door to the study open.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Dick startles, head whipping up; but it’s just Barbara.

He’s been in here for the better part of two hours, trying to put together a workable rough draft for his freshman thesis in cultural studies, and has gotten an astounding _nothing_ done: accepting the day as a wash on that front, he gives her his full attention.

“I’d like to think they’re worth more than _that_.” She looks lovely, in a modest, woolen green skirt and a crisp blouse. He used to think he was sweet on her; he still tries to be. Knows everybody else thinks he is, even Babs herself. Definitely Bruce.

(But when he’s alone, it’s not her that makes him flush like the schoolboy he tries not to be, not softness and vaguely floral hair and high, dulcet tones that make him sweat. Well. It is initially, he means, but then he gets to thinking too hard, about the bruises on his arms and shins, from patrol, and how Barbara is always so careful, would never accidently aggravate them, cause more, a trail leading down his neck or up his thigh, and—

—it’s all downhill from there, really.)

“You’re an expensive date, Grayson.” Her brazen manner is something he’s always admired about her, though at times like this he wishes her flirting were a bit less… forward.

He never wants to strike her down, and that’s not just his own cowardly reluctance to cause friction between them. She deserves more than a boy who can’t return her affections on the grounds of some deep seated sickness of the sexuality.

Her smile is sharp though, either not noticing or kindly disregarding (and if he’s being really honest, the latter is so much more likely) his sudden bout of recalcitrance, and moving on with impressive promptness.

“Got cabin fever yet, Boy Wonder?”

She gets a dry, obvious look, for that. It’s not even a question that bears asking at this point. Still, she seems pleased by his response (or lack thereof.)

“Good, ‘cause we’ve got work to do.” 

“Bruce gave you a mission?” Dick is momentarily, irrationally jealous; Babs is an auxiliary part of the team at best, too untrained (formally, at least) and untested to send her out on encounters of her own. To entrust her with this must mean that Bruce thinks Dick is, is too weak or lame to do it himself, to produce satisfactory results—

“Not… really? It’s a scoop, Dick, one the Bat hasn’t got recorded in all those meticulous case notes of his: trust me, I looked.”

“You want me to go over his head with you on something?” Evidently the tone of that wasn’t something she appreciated, because she scowled at him. Even though she was only three years older than he was, at eighteen, she projected an air of competency and adulthood that fooled even Dick sometimes, made him wary and complacent.

“How else are we ever going to branch out on our own two feet? He keeps me on any tighter a leash and we’ll be stepping on each other. And you two’ve been working together for years, without him even considering giving you a sense of autonomy!”

Dick thinks to say that it was really because he’d never actually asked for such a thing—Bruce was his best friend, and an incredible mentor. Maybe when he was older, Dick supposes, but at fifteen that’s not anything urgent on his mind. He decides against it when she plows on, persuasive and irreverent. 

“The shipment of platinum Scarface was jacking while his goons were giving you those lovely bruises is in warehouse 4B down on the east end of the docks—“

“You want us to go after Scarface, alone?”

“—and minimally protected! He’s got all his boys up at HQ in midtown because he thinks Bruce is gonna hit him at home for what he did to your lilywhite complexion—“

“My mother was Romani, I’m olive at least, and I really don’t think you’re understanding the implications of going behind the Boss’ back to tackle one of Gotham’s primary weapons dealers—“

“Not behind his back! We’re doing him a favor here! For the last three nights I’ve seen over three fourths of his regular crew sticking close to home turf. That leaves at least four to be doing drop off and pick up, which means a bust on the gold—“

“Platinum—“

“—oh, hush, will be easy pickings! There’ll be what, five guys? And not even his best.” She gives him a saucy look. “Unless you think the combined forces of Batgirl and Robin are so helpless without the Big Bad Bat that we can’t tackle five measly guys without running home to daddy.”

Dick swallows. Thinks about his nearly-healed hurts, and Bruce’s big hands, and the _shame_ of the man finding out the designs Dick’s subconscious have on him, left to fester in his inactivity.

Dick sighs. Stutters, for a moment, and then opens his mouth. “It has to be tomorrow night; Leslie wants him down at her clinic to get the stitches from that Two-Face debacle a couple of months ago removed, so he’ll be out early.”

“I knew I could count on you, baby bird!”

\---

It’s a blessedly dry night, and surprisingly mild for Gotham in the winter; Barbara’s calling it ‘fate,’ but Dick’s sticking with ‘uncanny.’

The warehouse, which is really a generous term for it, considering the dilapidated state of its roof and windows, is in a bad part of town. This makes sense, Dick supposes, and is certainly in-keeping with Scarface’s almost frenetic focus on being perceived as ‘clever’ and ‘smart.’ Nobody’d think to look for something with that much value here: too dangerous, open to the weather and the even less savory elements Gotham teems with.

He and Batgirl are stationed on a high roof about a block and a half away, peering out of clunky binoculars and trying desperately to seem like it was more informative to their ‘keen, detective eyes’ than it actually was.

“Run me through where you got this ‘tip’ from, again?”

“It wasn’t a tip! I tailed Mugsy back to that shoddy little bar east of the Narrows—“

“Archetto’s?”

“—and he met up with a couple of other members of Scarface’s crew: that guy with the rat teeth and the balding one! And they started talking about this place, because it’s such a hassle to get down here ever since dad cracked down on 8B where Penguin was keeping the imports from South America.”

“They just happened to be talking about it. In a public bar. Right after a heist.”

Barbara shot him a sharp look. “I was in disguise the entire time—no cowl or cape of Batgirl’s made an appearance all night! They couldn’t have known it was me, or that they were being trailed for that matter: five o’clock go-home traffic was in full swing, there were thousands of people catching cabs the same way that they were making their getaway.”

“I just…” Dick swallows thickly, gloved hands kneading softly at the bottom of his tunic.

“You’re not comfortable.”

Dick looks up, surprised and relieved, thinking she’s giving him an easy out, being a chum—

“Because Daddy didn't send you on your way with goodies and praise, and you’re not used to wearing big boy pants—“

“Batgirl!” It’s a tone much bigger than he is. “I’m uncomfortable because I think this plan is ill-conceived, not because I need someone else’s cape to curl into! Did you even bring the knockout gas?” 

Liar liar liar. 

She brushes her cape aside to reveal two sizeable canisters attached to the back of her belt. “Do you even need to ask?” She quips back, faux-snotty. They spend a silent moment making faces at each other, before Dick breathes deep, steeling himself.

“What are we waiting for, then?”

\---

The car ride home is characterized by one of the most oppressive atmospheres Dick has ever had the misfortune of encountering.

_A broken skylight, the loud ‘bang’ of a gas canister exploding onto concrete. It starts out so well. Dick is the noise and the action, the lightening before the thunder, as always: throwing the goons off guard, giving them something to try and focus on through the thick haze, while Barbara goes in behind them as they flounder in their frustration and takes them out properly. Batgirl gets one, two by the stairwell. Robin gets a third by knocking him off a metal railway with a wing-ding; broken shoulder blade, most likely, but no lethal damage. Four and five are bruisers, stationed near the cargo, addressed with a furious kick to the gut and dislocation of their jaw, rendering them unconscious._

_Then there’s—noise. Above, where Dick had knocked the man over the railing earlier, and okay, Barbara had said about five, not exactly, but…_

_The smoke is as much a hindrance to them at this point as it is to the enemy. Only use it when you know the circumstances, know your surroundings well enough to make them your weapon, Batman had said, and it makes something low and worried wrench in Dick’s chest, because Batman isn’t here._

“Bruce, I—“

“Unless you want us to have this conversation right here, don’t.”

Dick quiets, squirming.

_When goons number six and seven are down and they can still hear the rustling of movement from all around them, Dick begins to panic._

_“Batgirl, they’re—“_

_“Don’t talk, fight!”_

_The smoke is rapidly dissipating, leaving them open to prying eyes and clumsy crosshairs: Dick dives between two adjacent crates and sinks into the shadows, peering around through the clearing air._

_Ambush. There were—god. There had to be fifteen of them, with the sound of more cars pulling up outside. They’d wanted Batman to hear, wanted him to come, to be captured, and instead they’d gotten two stupid kids—_

_Someone is yelling out directions. He saw Batgirl slip behind a generator on the other side of the room, obscured but by no means hidden, just like him. They’re spreading out, searching for them. The element of surprise is gone, and now they’re just two teenagers, hiding in a den of thugs and murderers._

_A scream. Shots fired. At first he thinks Batgirl has done something stupid, something awful, and he’s far too frightened to look, but then—_

_“It’s the Bat!”_

_Relief makes Dick’s entire body shake, the pumping of his blood feeling obvious and intrusive in his neck, wrists, and ankles, loud as anything. Batman has found them._

_The thugs are short work; Dick worries momentarily when he hears the guys outside filing up to the entrance, but Bruce has blocked the door with something. Of course. Because he’s always prepared, always three steps ahead of anyone, of everyone._

_The sound of fists on flesh. Screaming, turning wet and repulsive as their teeth are knocked out, mouths filling with blood. Robin sits, and shakes, and smoothes his gloved hands primly down over his cape._

_A darker shadow is cast over him. He opens his eyes, under the white out lenses, but can’t look up. Batman is so big, and that’s important, somehow, but he can’t pin down why right now._

_“Robin.”_

“ **Robin.** ”

Dick startles upright. The car has stopped. They’re home. He dropped Batgirl off by the abandoned subway station where she’d stashed her clothes, not a word said. She was in trouble too, but her trouble would be addressed… later. After his own, he realized, sinking farther into the passenger seat, as the roof slid shut behind her and it was just him and Bruce, alone in the Batmobile. 

Bruce was using patrol names. That wasn’t good. That meant this wasn’t an anger Dick Grayson could cajole his way out of, smile and cuddle and endear into mild exasperation.

“Yes, Batman?”

Bruce breathes deeply, hands squeezing the steering wheel tight and then releasing, repetitive.

“Get changed. I’ll meet you upstairs.”

There’s an intense pressure behind Dick’s eyes.

“Yes, Batman.”

Padding softly over to the dressing curtain, he toes off his booties, stacking them neatly where they belong. His fingers shake as he begins unlacing the vest, undoing the hidden clasp taking more time than it probably should.

By the time the solvent has eaten away at the glue enough for him to pull his domino off, the skin beneath it is wet, god darn it, god darn it—

Wiping at his eyes too roughly with the back of his wrist, he reaches down to pull off his shorts, unstrapping the jock.

Oh god. Oh _no_.

He’s hard.

\---

The march upstairs is truly, genuinely awful—the kind when you’re going up the biggest hill of a roller coaster, where the anticipation is almost worse than the drop itself: Dick left alone with his thoughts, driving himself crazy.

He’d left the jock on. It wasn’t too visible, underneath the loose pajama pants, not unless you were really looking for it, because there was really no way he was going to be able to go up and face Bruce in their room with. With an erection.

He’d tried to get rid of it; a brisk shower would take too long, make Bruce madder, make it seem like Dick was trying to delay the inevitable, but there were other things.

He thought about cats and trapezes and things completely unrelated, but that didn’t keep his interest for long, didn’t really do anything, because he was too worked up about Bruce to fixate on anything else. He thought about how mad Bruce probably was at him, how he wasn’t supposed to feel like this, was going upstairs to be reprimanded, but that just made it worse.

Easier to leave the jock on, and hope Bruce wouldn’t notice; hope Bruce wouldn’t send him to his own room, cold and unused and alone, hope that the intrusive wall of plastic would keep him down for the night.

Bruce is sitting on the bed when Dick sticks his head in fearfully, legs hanging over the side of the in their flannel bottoms, chest as broad and bare and breath-catching as ever.

He steps in quietly, head lowered, blinking back tears. Thinking how awful it would be, how embarrassing, to cry in front of Bruce, and having to blink back more for how it made his penis twitch again.

“Do you know why I didn’t follow the ‘lead’ Barbara sent you two after, Dick?”

Dick inhales, opens his mouth to speak, but his throat is so tight with crying that it hurts, so he swallows it down, and shakes his head ‘no.’

“Did you think I didn’t know about it?” It’s a calm tone, free of malice or threat, and Dick’s not sure if that’s better or worse. He starts to shrug, then stops. Shakes his head ‘yes,’ because—well. He supposes that is the conclusion they’d come to. Dumb, in retrospect.

“They’ve been circulating that ‘bit’ of info anywhere with any semblance of privacy for the past three weeks. Did you get a look at the hangar doors in there, while you and Batgirl were playing lone ranger?”

Another no.

“They’re too low to get crates the size of which the shipping company that transported the stolen platinum use inside; at least on a forklift, which would have been necessary for anything of weight that substantial.”

Dick looks at his feet, dragging bare toes across the carpet.

“Come here, Dick.”

Dick goes. He’s trying, he’s trying so hard, but his breath hitches as he stops in front of Bruce’s knees, and he knows he’s going to shatter any second now.

“You could have been killed. If I hadn’t put that tracking device in Barbara’s cowl I never would’ve found you two; never would’ve believed she’d have the ill judgment to go after something like that alone, or occurred to me that you might show that same lapse by going with her, despite explicit orders not to attempt anything strenuous, and certainly not without myself or Alfred there to—“

A sad, quiet, hiccupping sob, as the hang of Dick’s hair over his face can no longer obscure the tears dripping down his chin, nose running disgustingly.

“Dick. I’m not saying this to try and make you feel bad, I’m telling you this because I love you, and I was so worried—“

“No, that’s not what I- Bruce, I’m—I’m hard.” Whispered like the worst secret imaginable.

Bruce freezes, the hand that had come up to thumb the moisture off Dick’s cheeks stopping, motionless. 

“I beg your pardon?”

“I’m _c-crying_ because I’m _ashamed_ , and i-it _aroused_ m-me, which made me _more ashamed_ , which made it **worse**!” It’s expelled in one huge, messy breath, and he’s sure this is it, that Bruce is going to send him back to his room, send him away, to somewhere where they fix people like him, and he’ll never get to be Robin or sleep next to Bruce again.

“Does this happen… often?”

Dick stands there, startled and so deeply mortified, for a few more seconds. Sniffles, and then tries to pull back, to flee, because this is the beginning of the end, but maybe if he can make himself shut up about it, never bring it up again—

“Robin.”

He freezes, like one of Pavlov’s dogs, and Bruce pulls him back towards the bed, picking him up by the scruff of his nightshirt and sitting him down on it.

“I just—sometimes.” It’s a quieter voice than he’s ever used before.

“Sometimes… I need….” He stops himself. Rearranges the words in his head, until they don’t sound… lewd. Don’t sound inherently sick, but that’s, that’s what this is, isn’t it—foolish of him to try and deceive Bruce, to hope he’s willing to read it some way that won’t bring to light the… the deviant Dick become. “That is to say, I—“

“It’s perfectly alright, Dick.”

A large hand on his head, carding gently through his hair. Bruce’s eyes are fixed carefully on his cheek instead of his eyes, but he suspects that’s more for his own benefit: he’d shrink from the attention, during a conversation like this, unmanfully unable to retain eye contact discussing his abnormalities.

It’s not okay, though, and Dick doesn’t know how Bruce can’t see that: this is the kind of, of ungentlemanly craving catered to in the seedy, low light clubs that require passwords to enter, the kind that they often encounter on vice missions, who’s clientele tends to be, by and large, the filth of humanity, the crooks and call girls and addicts. Who those places attract. 

They’re the only places Dick has ever seen people who react to… to traditionally unpleasant physical contact like he does, to distain, humiliation, like he does. Women and men in collars and harnesses: whipped, beaten, spanked, and leaning into it, moaning for it as all manner of, of awful things were said about them.

He’d only been on surveillance one of these instances, only subject to the full spectacle of depravity once: watching for a man called Jimmy Hangnail in a shadowy corner while Bruce hunted down his drug dealing associates. When Bruce—Matches—had come by to check on him, notes passed by a sympathetic waitress the only clue they might know each other, Dick had begged off the duty, stating he simply didn’t have the stomach for it, and Bruce had graciously accepted this: sending Gordon’s squad in to deal with the pushers who’s addresses Batman had ascertained and taking watch while Dick, back in civilian clothes, waited for Alfred up on street level, sick to his stomach-

-and harder than he’d ever been in his life. That was the first night, fingers pressing tentatively, ever-so-careful, into the bruises of patrol, and then harder for the way it made his toes curl and his cock drip.

“It’s pain too, and. Bruce, I’m, I’m so sorry, I know I was dumb and I was bad and I’ll fix it, I’ll never say anything about it again if you just keep me, just don’t send me away—“

“Robin.” That name again, that name in this room, but this time Bruce looks fascinated—like he’s discovered something entirely new, something he’d never thought to exist before, transfixed by how rigid his protégé’s spine goes, and the shiver that runs through the tense muscles of his thighs.

“Dick. I’m not going to send you away. I could never…”

A pause. They both try to compose themselves. They both fail.

“There’s nothing wrong with you. Different people— well, they have different inclinations, and just because the things that-” Bruce’s eyes dart down to the crotch of his pants, as though he can’t help himself; linger there for a second, uncomprehending, before his pupils dilate at the realization that Dick has worn his jock to bed “-stimulate you are considered… unconventional does not mean they’re wrong.”

“But it’s _guys_ , Bruce.” A prominent swallow, another instance where they both know what Dick really meant to say: _It’s you, Bruce._

“Irrelevant.”

They’re quiet, for a few seconds. Bruce’s hand is back up to Dick’s cheek, but it’s cupping it now, fingers in his hair, thumb rubbing ever so slightly up and down, up and down, at the corner of Dick’s mouth, the friction making it ruddy with blood.

“You’re not alone, Dick. You’re not even the first person I’ve encountered with such a proclivity.”

Dick breathes deep. Opens his mouth a little at the next swipe of thumb, bold.

“Would you perhaps like me to-“

“Yes. If it’s—if you don’t mind-“

“Not at all.”

\---

“Spread your legs a little wider; there we are.”

A deep breath, squirming on the finger already inside of him as his eyelids flutter wildly. Dick is awed, perplexed, and so beautiful, with his narrow waist and ample hips, that it makes Bruce wonder how this bright boy could ever have thought he might be sent away or forgotten.

Dick is naked now, clothes in a pile beside the bed, protective cup gone (but not before Bruce put a hand there and pressed it into his aching prick, hard, and it had _hurthurthurt_ so good that Bruce had to tug at his balls to stop him from ejaculating inside of it right then.)

Bruce still has his pants on, but that’s good, that’s Correct: Bruce and his big presence and his booming patrol voice in the bedroom, very much in charge and the only thing Dick can focus on.

“Fffu-oh!” Dick can feel the expletive building before it makes it out into the open air between them: uncouth, distasteful language that he knows Bruce is distressed that their nightly activities have introduced him to. Leaning in, he nips pointedly at Dick’s clavicle. Moves his mouth to the juncture of his shoulder to bite marks into young, elastic skin, just a little bit of blood where the older man’s tapered canines pressed.

“Language, chum.”

“I’m—I’m sorry Bruce, I didn’t m-mean to—“ A high, abrupt shout, dragging itself out into something low and decadent, Dick’s hands fisting in the sheets like he doesn’t know what to do with himself. He’s uncommonly awkward in his own body, in this moment, utterly unaccustomed to the idea of carnal pleasures, at least when they’re being tended to by an outside party. Bruce pushes his thumb into the hollow of Dick’s hip and keeps pushing, until he can feel the blood rushing to the area, feel it darkening with the outline of a hand. “—golly that feels s-ah!-swell, though.”

Bruce kisses his cheek, kisses his shoulder and the corner of his mouth: chaste, gentlemanly, as another finger is wedged in next to the first one in Dick’s little pink rectum.

They’re lubricated, of course, the momentary pause to rifle through his nightstand well worth it; the kind of pain lack thereof might cause isn’t anything Bruce is willing to indulge. Still, he’s still taking it uncommonly fast. Certainly faster than he normally would, was this any other kind of encounter. As fast as he reasonably can, without worry of ripping or tearing. 

Dick is young, so young beneath him, young enough to make him feel every year of his thirty-five, feel sick. But the boy loves it, is incoherent with it, as Bruce slowly parts his two fingers inside of the teen, scissors them in time with the brutal thrusting motion.

“Oh gosh, gosh, gosh, g-uh!”

“You’re doing such a good job, Dick—“

But Dick shakes his head, a shiver running through his whole body, and says, “I’ve been— Bruce, I was so—“

“Bad?”

A ‘yes,’ barely audible, sighed into Dick’s bicep as his arms reach up above his head, looking for something to grab onto, to ground himself with.

“And you think you should be punished?” Another shudder wracks the lithe frame. Bruce leans closer, another finger, more friction, and Dick is this close to falling to pieces when a hand is pressed to the still-yellow bruising right below his line of stitches, Bruce’s voice lowering still into the gravel of the Bat.

“Perhaps a spanking?”

Dick is gone. His entire body arches up, up into the hand still pushing down on traumatized skin, and the three huge fingers stuffing him so full, too full, until he can’t stand it anymore.

A jet of ejaculate hits the bottom of his chin, landing in thick lines up his chest and stomach as he exhales reedily, entire body seeming to deflate. Somewhere outside of his haze of endorphins he hears a wet, vulgar noise: body clenching around the fingers still inside of him, still moving when he realizes what it is, that Bruce is masturbating.

Because of him.

Dick’s chafed penis sluggishly dribbles more cum into his bellybutton when he feels Bruce’s release join his own in a sticky mess on his chest, still murmuring a quiet “ah” with every movement of that hand until it’s ever-so-carefully pulled free, with a slick, frankly disgusting ‘pop.’

He thinks they’re going to… not cuddle, maybe, now, but lie down for a while, perhaps, because he’s so tired, and Bruce looks it, but. 

No. He’s scooped into a sitting position in Bruce’s arms, and the older man walks them into the bathroom to begin running water into the tub. It’s a silent affair; largely because Bruce has never been much of a talker without prompting, and Dick’s too out of sorts to provide stimulating conversation of kind, at the moment.

He gets nervous, though, when Bruce wipes off his chest before lowering them both into the bath with exceptional awareness of all of Dick’s old and, um—newer hurts.

“Bruce, are we…”

His chest is scrubbed with mild body wash, big hands careful to skirt around the worst of the bruising, though he’s unable to avoid interacting with it entirely. 

It’s too soon for Dick to be hard again, but only just.

“Are we alright?” 

Bruce grabs his chin, and tilts his head so they’re eye to eye.

“Perfectly.”

“And can we… can we do that again?”

His answer is a kiss.

**Author's Note:**

> Because of Cornflake’s post a few weeks back. It was going to be more focused on the actual swearing thing, and then it kind of mutated into Confused Teen Masochist, Dick Grayson. Cross posted to tumblr.


End file.
